Monday, March 2, 2009

I grew up with these brownies, which are technically blondies. The Joy of Cooking, where the recipe comes from, calls them butterscotch brownies, but Wikipedia says that they are blondies. When I think about blondies, I don't picture these bars, which are dense and almost sticky and sweet and addictive. Believe me, I'm too ashamed to tell you how many I ate after dinner. The chunk cut out of the pan above is what I ate before dinner. My mom used to make these when we were kids, and I used to make them when I was younger. This is one of the first recipes I converted to gluten-free, because it only uses 1/2 cup of flour. I've found that those are the easiest recipes for substitutions.

This recipe can be made in two ways. You can make the basic recipe, as is, and have a thin, chewy, slightly dense wonderful bar (above). You can also double the recipe, and make a cakey, fluffy bar. I like the single recipe best, but they're great both ways.

Revised from the archives

Butterscotch Brownies

From the Joy of Cooking, can be doubled. I've cut down on the butter because I don't need to be eating this much butter.

Melt the butter in the microwave, then stir in the brown sugar until completely moistened. Let cool slightly, then stir in the rest of the ingredients. Pour into a well greased 8x8 pan and bake 15-20 minutes at 350. If you double the recipe, bake 25-35 minutes. Cool, then slice into 16 squares and enjoy. Use restraint.

What did I do wrong?? I felt as if there should be another egg or something, as there was never a "batter" - maybe you meant 1/4 POUND of butter? 1/4 c = 1/2 a stick, but that's what I used. Anyway, super disappointing, but I'll try again, and try and make some adjustments. I had a GF artisan-style bread disaster last night, too, so this is extra painful! : /) Cheers!!

i saw this while i was waiting for dinner to cook and HAD to make them for desert (single batch) and i used a pie pan. SOOOOO yummy. also using a well greased pie pan made it super easy to flip over onto a plate and then inhale lol. thanks for the recipes!

I was thinking that it needed more butter also, because it was not like browine batter at all it was more like a paste, maybe the sugar needed to be cut back also....or maybe 1 stick (1/4#) of butter not 1/4 cup they were good though just more like chewy candy not browines but good

Celiaclady- If you use any more than 1/2 stick of butter (4T) things get really greasy. Maybe your pan was too big? These are supposed to be thin and chewy, like in the picture, not as chewy as candy but they are definitely different than brownies. If you want something more like brownies, double the recipe to make thicker ones.

Jen-I only make them once in a while, because whenever I do I CAN'T not eat them all. Oh they're so good. Or I will make them when people are coming over and I can give them away, so I don't eat every single last one.

Strange as it seems, 3-4T. butter is the right amount even though it never seems like typical brownie batter. I've experimented and more than that makes them too greasy - the low amount of flour just can't absorb more than 4T. butter.